P s 



THE 



RIM 



OLIN'E TILFORD 




Class 

Book 



COPlfRIGHT DEPOSm 



BOOKS BY OLIVE TILFORD DARGAN 

Published by CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 

THE CYCLE'S RIM. i2mo net, $1.00 

THE MORTAL GODS and Other Plays. i2mo 

net, 1.50 
LORDS AND LOVERS and Other Dramas 

i2mo net, 1.50 



THE CYCLE'S RIM 



THE CYCLE'S RIM 



BY 
OLIVE TILFORD DARGAN 



NEW YORK 

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 

1916 



< 



oV 






Copyright, 1916, by 
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 



Published November, 1916 




NOV 15 1916 



^CI.A44637G 



TO 
ONE DROWNED AT SEA 



I 



Deep lies thy body, jewel of the sea, 

Locked down with wave on wave. Pearl-drift among 

The coral towers, and yet not thee, not thee ! 

So lightly didst thou mount, blue rung o'er rung, 

The lustred ladder rippling from that land 

Of strangely boughed and wooing wildernesses. 

Province of dream unwaning, dream yet banned 

From sleepers in the sun ; but thou, as presses 

The lark that feels his song, sped to thy sky. 

unrepressed ! If thou wouldst choose be gone, 

What sea-charm then could stay thee, bid thee lie 

Too deep for cock-crow earth or heaven's dawn ? 

Yet must I chant these broken, mortal staves, 

And lay my leaf of laurel on the waves. 



n 



When God has dropped his garlands to the earth, 

And birds in twittering showers cry "Spring, 
Spring!" 

What heart among us then knows not rebirth, 

Nor would, if harp were his, go forth and sing? 

And when again He takes his garlands in, 

Baring the earth His wish had warmed with rose. 

Till eyes that meet no bloom seem made in vain. 

How bows the heart and like a mourner goes ! 

So would I sing and mourn. Sing how Life wore 

Thee for her Spring, her rose, her radiance spread; 

And mourn — ^nay ! — not for me is moaning sore. 

Who see thee now God's garland never dead. 

But I will sing, and if men -smile and say 

" A Laura hymns her Petrarch," so they may. 



Ill 



Alas ! this Laura's lips are not blest banks 

Where flows the marvel measure of the stream 

Whose drops are words. Dumb peasant, she gives 
thanks 

For any rough-spun web to dress her dream 

And make it visible to eyes that doubt; 

And doubting see but air where seraph shape 

Makes radiant the roads that wind about 

Earth's twilight fringes that too heavy drape 

The striving lance of sight. But she, so poor 

In shining words that those who hear must scoff, 

Bears in her eyes such riches, such dear lure 

Of vision, that ere dies the mocker's laugh, 

She forward springs to take thee by the hand, 

Nor stays her joy till doubters understand. 



rv 



Then back through lifting arches of the years 

On arrow feet we run. The spent, prone days 

Rise mantling where they dusked. Sod-sunken tears, 

That dropped as cypress brew upon these ways, 

Shine up like eyes joy-soft. The clammy shade 

Of forest doubts clings now like faith that fills 

Cathedral air when holy touch is laid 

On saintly kneelers. Love, love, what thrills 

Tremble from heart to heaven ! Is it ours. 

This world where leaves and light and faces all 

Learn manners of the dove? This earth that flowers, 

Shallop of rose whose petals never fall? 

Where we infolded sail, the stars our strand, — 

Our irised islands where our dreams may land. 



V 



Now lock my eyes their lids and lose the key 

To every world but that vast world we found 

When heaven was a flowering orchard tree, 

All earth a tender ring of April ground; 

For we have come unto our day of days, 

When our two souls and God made trothal feast; 

Each apple spray an angel witness was, 

Each still grass blade a little waiting priest; 

Your words throbbed free, each one a prisoned bird 

Finding at last the sky, till all the air 

Beat like a winged sea, and I who heard 

Sat mute as God who fell in wonder there. 

He made the sun, but Love had made the word 

That new suns bore when He no finger stirred. 



VI 



Joy is my earth where I am planted now ! 
My roots drink of her veins and thirst no more. 
Upward she builds me, stem and gowned bough, 
And buds are sweet where never bloom I bore. 
I hear the waters rise in hidden springs 
That are to feed me from cool treasuries 
In far, untrampled lands. I hear the wings 
That from dim mountains and sky-gated seas 
Shall nestle like caught wonders whispering 
My tremorous green more tremorous prophecies; 
Till Dream, the venturer, pause at last to sing 
And leave me nest that never silent is. 
Gold bounty from the sun I shall not need; 
My radiance then the needy sun shall feed. 



II 



vn 



There's topaz on the winds that touch my hair, 

There's sapphire on the water where my hands 

Dive under ripples, flirting with your prayer 

" Drown not my doves ! " Flame, flame, a white flame 
bands 

The sky, but cool as purity, or snood 

That binds a maid's dew-dreams. Love, that gave 

The bird its wing, brown earth the quivering wood. 

The fish its fin, a free sky to the slave. 

And man his God, give me the song that breaks 

Like buds from heart-sod,— darts with pollen flying 

To lips of lyric bloom, and silvery wakes 

The trembling morrows, sweeter for that crying. 

One deathless song, — of all thy gifts the crown, — 

Flute-call of lovers till Time's sun go down. 



11 



VIII 

Forgive, bright Power, and my suit forget ! 
My lute I lift, but love that shone so near, 
A fairy lantern in a lily set, 
Now rides the sky, moon-whirling Jupiter ! 
As one who stands beside a breaking sea 
And fatuous strives with fainting voice to reach 
Across the waves, where mild shores hidden be, 
To charm the ear of dancers on the beach. 
Would I sing now if now I sought to rhyme 
Love's ocean-flexures with immortal word 
For lovers on the shores yet waiting Time; 
But, keyed so frail, I, like that little bird 
Whose song is gaily pitched above man's ear. 
Shall not less happy sing though none may hear. 



12 



IX 



My love ! Shy as the wonder in a young deer's eye, 

Bold as a seer with every riddle read; 

Swift as the dagger fire of storm's dusk sky, 

Loitering as light where June's late lilies bed. 

Now is thy soul a glacier-girdled lake 

That never mirrored murk of human gaze, 

And now, a rebel rillet, 'twould partake 

Of dusty joys by trundled, peasant ways. 

Thou art an ardor that would burn the sea; 

Thou art the tremor of a far, white sail; 

Thou art a linnet's dream; the poetry 

That sleeps in Asia; wakes to walk in mail. 

A thousand loves should wed these thousand men. 

" Thou art my thousand women," saidst thou then. 



13 



X 



Why do I love thee? Thee, my other wing? 

Sweet of the wild? My tree of cinnamon? 

Not for thine eyes where twilights wandering 

Lead me beyond the world past any sun 

Whose arrows query after. Not for pearls 

Within thy voice, that bring with them the sea 

They could not leave; nor thy low laugh that curls 

Soft captor rings round fireside mystery; 

Nor faun in thee that seeks a forest goal 

Hid in my heart; nor hermit's shade and tent 

Thou makest of thine arms for my bare soul 

When, stripped of vision, there I creep forspent. 

Nay, I know not. Thus is my love defended 

'Gainst ambushed Time. Know, and love's day is 
ended. 



14 



XI 



The cloud-dropped shadow over meadows moving, 

Whose double in the sky so whitely rides, 

Takes shape and being, slow or swiftly roving. 

But as its high begetter shapes and guides. 

So hearts are meadows for love's ever-passing; 

Unmortal shadow, mould and motion given 

By regent substance high above possessing. 

Unalterable save by a change in heaven. 

And I am not as bold astronomers 

Who name all planets in that heaven moving. 

Which loosens, binds, which speeds and which deters; 

Love knows them not who know the why of loving. 

Their hearts are free; if ever by love tied, 

Their maps will be forgot or stout denied. 



15 



xn 

Ah well, we know the universe we know 

A sandgrain is unto the one that has 

No boundary in thought, and all the show 

That science makes is as a juggler's pass 

Outside the circus door of wonders. Spheres 

Fly animate with aim, while man doth make 

His genial plaudits that awake no ears 

Beyond his own; at his breath's end they break. 

Truth is the planet's eye, but yet is faith 

Her mighty telescope, uncovering all 

The formless outworlds, till the Whisperer saith 

"There lie my bower-lands; let go this ball." 

Yet in one heart we wall His globed demesne. 

Nor need of windows when we've all within. 



16 



Ill 



XIII 

FvE built for Love a cabin on the cliffs, 

And in the door he sits with moody wings 

At rest from flight. Here all his tiffs 

Are with the winds and stars and soaring things, 

While in and out an eager slave I go, 

Now at the hearth, now making white the floor. 

Now to the table pass with curds of snow. 

My furtive eyes upon the sunny door. 

Wilt stay, my cloudling? Here thou still canst breathe 

Thy heavenly meadows. Sleeping on my breast, 

Thy playmates more than mortal still may wreathe 

Unearthly charms about thee. Dear my guest. 

What sweeter place than this where dwells 

The mountain violet with thine asphodels? 



19 



XIV 

The wind's old wine was in my heart that day 

I ran through brake and laurel by the road 

Where dumb as pride you passed. Thought I to play 

The dryad spy, then must you be a god ! 

Softly I rustled, lightly leapt and clomb. 

And glanced 'tween leaves to see if shadows hung 

Still darkly on, or if delight swept home 

To eyes and brow, — so teased until your tongue 

Rewon its chanting magic, and the air 

Was full of jewels dropping, burnished so ! 

Then from a crystal spring white feet glanced bare. 

With red drops trickling. " Stain upon that snow! " 

An instant, and your lips those rubies wore; 

Then lips of mine could not deny you more. 



20 



XV 

Sordid my life, they say, and they say true, 
If the world's favor be life's only sun. 
Here in the firelight where I bake and brew 
None save immortals look me smiling on. 
Ah, only Heaven's vagrants! If I durst 
Take mine own chair an angel must get up, 
And, would I drink, ere I may ease my thirst 
Celestial lips make bright my cabin cup. 
But no silk robes trail hither for my sake, 
And for my dear, he is a lord so poor 
His dreams are bare of gold. He can but take 
A thread from Fate, and, leaving not his door. 
If he there will, beneath a threshold vine. 
Spin white eternity in one brief line. 



21 



XVI 

No, we^ll not wrangle for a little world ! 

That world below, so fevered, full of ills. 

Think not, my life, my song, that Fd be whirled 

Mid those mad powers, tho' in their grinding mills 

I might, a prophet passing, drop the flame 

That starts millennium, if millennium bread 

Builds all to one stale measure. Shall we maim 

The rising god? Lop off the giant's head 

And stilt Tom Thumb? Forbid the living ground 

Its wild variety, till smooth as lies 

A magnate's lawn, at last the earth is round? 

That heavenward trundling with our polished prize, 

God's laughter we may hear, low, lyrical, 

So pleased is He with his pretty ball. 



22 



xvn 

Yet that were better than this giant sieve 

Wherein mankind is rustled to and fro, 

Saving coarse chaff, while wasting winds receive 

The fine and precious worth so shaken through. 

Homeless, we can not see above a roof; 

Naked, 'twere Heaven to be gowned and shod; 

'Twixt art and vision ever is the loaf ; 

Fed, clad, and housed, still do we dwarf our god. 

Concerned to keep nor be as others bare. 

Oh, break the monstrous mesh with wisdom's flail 

That tosses chaff and living grain doth spare. 

Till, where loss ached, life surge imperial, 

And men as mountains be, lifting to skies 

Unshrouded, shining inequalities! 



23 



xvm 

But thou dost draw me deeper in the nook 
Time makes for lovers in an hourless grove, 
Folding the world away, a weary book. 
To read me still the unwearying book of love. 
Ay, dear my all, why should we haste and waste, 
And restless toss on action's turbid bed, 
Fearing too early sleep, when chokes at last 
With opiate dust all Being's fountain-head? 
Utopias died for, must they too not die? 
And even the Tree of Life with shrunken boughs 
Shake with death-shudder earth and hell and sky. 
Meeting the winter that no spring shall rouse? 
But hold me close, for stirs my heart in sleep 
To walk with those who late do work and weep. 



24 



IV 



XIX 

In light transfigured who can more than shine? 

Where banquets God, can more than silent feast? 

The unwrit wonder passes: shall we pine, 

With fumbling pen behind an echo ceased? 

"\i\^en frail words break 'tis music to be dumb; 

For lesser cadence is the singing line; 

Not for Creation's rhjrthms that cageless hum 

When nerves are boughs of fire round veins that twine 

Like smothered winds. Content us, love, to let 

Torn Heaven through us fare, though but to break 

And leave us with no mark that men may set 

On reason's hills. Content, for Life must make 

The wild birth hers. What is her poetry 

But madness masked in Beauty's charity? 



27 



XX 



Love broken lies, a tassel of the wind 

Caught on my breast. Now must he hear my song. 

My timid reed can shyest music find 

That bold pipes miss. Though dawn to dawn be long, 

Brief runs the dark and light by charmed ears flowing; 

Each Hour prints her light foot, a little dell, — 

Too small for step of Care, like Titan growing, — 

Where greenly lapped we hide from noisy swell 

Of mom's flamingoes rippling up the gray. 

From noon's gold trump that makes our shut lids 
tremble. 

From eve's horizon dust and sunset bray, 

From synod winkings when cold stars assemble. 

With face of flowers shall the minutes go. 

While soft my notes, like laden bees, drift low. 



28 



XXI 

What is this thirst no cup we drain can slake? 
What royal touch may heal our troubling blood 
Till salve and crutch are spurned, and in our wake 
The air is blest? Time, when shall unhood 
The highlands of our yearning? Echoless 
Long since the pagan fields, once travel-kissed 
And musical with feet; and long we press 
These pastures chill that climb from mist to mist 
On stairways of dead gods. What if the end 
Is but to end not? Whispering fir and pine 
Shall fool us still, and on the peak no Friend 
Step from cloud bastions with the wings and wine? 
But, dear my dear, what way can be too long 
If in our shadows shelter Love and Song? 



29 



XXII 

I AM a tree that puts out little boughs 

Dreaming of harvest and a mellow moon; 

But Love, who owns me by my many vows, 

Comes nibbling, nibbling, late and oft and soon. 

I like his lips upon my tender leaves; 

'Tis joy to make him feasts of honey-buds; 

But doubts come trembling, and a fear me grieves,- 

I may stand barren in the laden woods. 

And Love himself some day may seek my shade 

To find but bony branches waiting him. 

What shelter could I give him weary laid? 

What succoring fruit from any staring limb? 

Ah, Love, do not my harvest dream devour, 

Lest thou know famine in my barren hour. 



30 



XXIII 

God, what tumult buried is, unguessed 
As strife that rends a smiling-windowed house. 
Within that hidden room, a woman's breast. 
When agony on guard must make fair bows 
To casual fortune ! So communing I 
Stood 'neath the pines that warmed a little hill; 
Smiled on the hours, and gave the empty sky 
A soul of hope, for one would come and fill 
The tender region with a sweeter breath. 
Though all the air was Spring's; or he would put 
On warrior beauty, victor be whose faith 
No rout e'er knew; or anything but — but! 
Then sank I, sudden stone, no stir or start, 
As loomed the heart of shadows o'er my heart. 



31 



XXIV 

But came that later eve beneath that sky ! 
Where dropped the scented circlet of the pines 
Around me mute, the moon's slow hours went by. 
No more my lips would touch the wine of wines; 
Renouncement, palest star o'er mortals set. 
Crept to me cold as light upon a grave; 
Sole lamp for me, no other would be lit 
By God or Life or Time, however brave 
Might rise the last despair. Then out of night 
Your laughter covered me like ointment spilled; 
Around me pealed your words, a torrent light. 
And my sick soul rose up, virgin and healed. 
On radiance walking. 0, as Heaven had broke, 
And dropped her little stars, you golden spoke ! 



32 



XXV 

Beside an oak, sprung in deformity, 
Curved backward to the ground in mighty pain, 
Today we paused, nor dared I look on thee 
Until I saw how straight it leapt again. 
Bold to the skies, leaf-fingers on the blue. 
As proud alive as any thought of God, 
Sipping the sun as heaven's favored do, 
Sending the light's tide whispers to the sod. 
Then vowed my eyes to thine no conduits dark 
Feeding thy veins from tragic under-earth 
Should hold thee bowed; the regions of the lark 
For thee should open, thee by second birth 
Made heir and comrade of the sky that bides 
No pulse too weak for joy's eternal tides. 



35 



XXVI 

The pasture is a forest where we lie; 

The slender grasses rise, a wilderness 

With mammoth bars that cage the captive sky, 

As jungle-deep thy cheek to mine I press. 

One clover blossom is a blackened sun 

That threatens now earth's summer-sweetened face. 

One humble-bee rocks high his nettle throne 

Vast as he were of Saturn's fallen race. 

So may it be that the soul's sunken eye. 

By earth disvantaged, fooled by mountain tears, 

Makes height and depth too weary deep and high. 

And blinding minutes swell to burdened years. 

For God's great spaces not a breath have we; 

The wave we climb is larger than the sea. 



36 



XXVII 

Against a tree deep rooted past the fear 

Of any winds, yet by the mad wind swayed, 

I lean my body weary with the sheer 

Climb from the valley. Far the huge hills fade, 

Thin ghosts of storm. Thrilled, fearless as the tree, 

I move with its brave rhythm, as one might swing 

In wildly sweet, adventuring ecstasy 

O'er an abyss on an archangePs wing. 

Could I thus stay thee, hold thee, my dear. 

With mighty roots of mine when tempests beat, 

Give thee thy storms, the sky a girdle wear. 

Yet ever safe, how godly great and sweet 

Would my heart grow ! Faint heart that offers thee 

A straw, a reed, a trembling willow tree ! 



37 



XXVIII 

" Think not I love thee less because the less 
Each day I love the earth that still is fair, 
And that my lips grow paler as they press 
Thy brow, thine eyes, thy tossed dusk of hair. 
Far shores sweet voices have, and I have heard 
Sounds from a shore so far no dream divining 
May coast its wonder, and my veins are stirred 
With palms that tremble there, to no eye shining. 
These violets that sweet my fingers make 
For having plucked them, fairer doubles have 
That I with fairer hands stoop down and take 
Unto my heart. Thou'lt find them on my grave. 
Oh, grieve not ! Herbs that heal us first must die; 
And may I dead heal thee immortally ! " 



38 



XXIX 

So sang I when the sunset drew my breath 

Into itself upon the far world's edge, 

And touched me with the dream that men call death. 

So sang I softly by your window ledge, 

While you within dropped tears upon a book 

You did not read; then coming out the door. 

Three snowflake kisses from my lips you took, 

And, palely as a priest might vow, you swore 

By Pity's bosom and by Mercy's tear. 

You would not stay me, would not make me late 

At holy feast on any sun or sphere; 

Nay, would not hold me with one kiss's weight. 

But would f orthspeed when you my cold hand lost 

To clasp it first where God himself stands host. 



39 



VI 



XXX 

The tower-star that lit the peaks of soul 
And all the encircling sea of tribute dreams, 
Has fallen to the waves. Now fathoms roll 
Unanswering where ten thousand loyal beams 
Leapt to their lofty centre. Slow I pass 
Where, choosing me, God late a lantern swung, 
My numb, blind feet now fumbling the morass 
With not a quivering gleam about them hung. 
Some flowers there be that nightly earthward lean, 
Yet with their sleeping lids feel for the East 
Where dawn shall be, nor weary dark may wean 
Their dream from fealty. For me no feast 
Of day will break. Be shut my eyes or ope. 
There is no East. Nightbound I creep and grope. 



43 



XXXI 

My Carmel withers ^neath the foot of Spring, 

And perished is my house of ivory; 

My lake of Edom is a brackish thing; 

No more my mountains drop sweet wine to me; 

There is no song from any temple coming, 

Oh, not a Bethel stone for my sunk head ! 

Beneath my altar is the banewort blooming, 

A bitter salt is on my holy bread. 

My aspiration that as eagle flew 

Through conquered skies, falls plumb and leaden still; 

Ambition's fires are dead of tearful dew; 

I stir cold ashes when I urge my will. 

Love was the sun I read all meanings by, 

And called the habit life; that broke, I die. 



44 



XXXII 

The tulips make the month a rajah*s walk; 

Turbanned the season comes, a nodding Ind; 

Young dandelions squat upon their stalk 

Like children at a show; the clouds float thinned, 

A broken troop beneath the bannered blue; 

But no heart beats in any flowering thing; 

No little flames lie in cold eyes of dew. 

By Heaven's care of man, this is not Spring ! 

The earth's in coffin, and these imps are called 

To paint her cheeks and wreathe her dead, gold hair; 

And there's no mourner, no wild drops that scald 

A paling face, as through the tearless air 

Her chill, rouged body drifts to charnel shore; 

For Love died first, and Grief can weep no more. 



45 



XXXIII 

Shall I go back, as one whom Fate retrieves, 
Where friends are waiting with forbearing smile. 
True hands held out, that touch me like dead leaves, 
So tender they, and I so numb the while? 
May be their souls are staggering as mine own. 
But bold they walk, and laugh in Life's warm ear 
As I can not, so feeble have I grown. 
My small horizon's arc set in a tear. 
Fate, loosen me ! Is it not time to go 
When no thing holds me but thy wilful grip? 
When I, a child of smiles who sought to show 
No cup too bitter for the chrismed lip. 
Shudder from touch of joy, rude, buoyant, crass? 
And wounds seem gates to God? Then let me pass. 



46 



XXXIV 

When failed I, love, in what thou badst be done? 

When foundst thou me as now, slow, blundering? 

Name me the desert that I fell upon; 

Where is the depth we crossed not, wing to wing? 

What mount of venture, wild with jut and spur, 

Heard thy swift step while I kept lowland home? 

At lips of stars who stood interpreter? 

Un wrote and writ in sun their sombre doom? 

But this dark last, this thing impossible. 

This hard command beyond my wizardry. 

Lift from my heart. 'Tis not love's miracle. 

Upon my struggling pulse thou 'st laid the sea. 

No more I eat of magic meat and bread. 

Ask me not this — to live when thou art dead. 



47 



VII 



XXXV 

I COME again where, like strung jewels, run 
The highland waters ; where for me the hills ^ 
Throw back their veils like virgins that have won 
Celestial gates. The moss-lapped season spills 
Green treasure over footprints that I seek, 
But tears will find them 'neath the deepest cover, 
And I may lay me down and warm my cheek 
With happy sod where passed, as sun, my lover. 
Ah, not alone these fragrant heights he pressed. 
These honey-suckle ways up granite steeps 
Where earth in tender emerald has drest 
Her bones that pillar heaven. Time, that now sleeps 
Like poppied fire, once played the etcher's part 
On all these paths, his pen upon my heart. 



51 



XXXVI 

Today I went among the mountain folk 
To hear the gentle talk most dear to me. 
I saw slow tears, and tenderness that woke 
From sternest bed to light a lamp for thee. 
And "Is it true? " hope asked and asked again, 
And " It is true," was all that I could say, 
And pride rose over love to hide gray pain 
As eyes tears might ungrace were turned away. 
So much they loved thee I was half decoyed 
By human warmth to feel thee near, but when 
I put my hand out all the earth was void, 
And vanished even these near-weeping men. 
Thus each new time I find that thou art gone, 
Anew do I survive the world, alone. 



52 



XXXVII 

Eyes, voice and smile, thou didst as Heaven spend ! 

Hid in a nook of Autumn once we came 

To a brown forest road. Lone in a bend 

A cottage rose, where stately sat a dame 

Gazing from age's ruin. With soft tread 

Her gloom you parted; magically glowed 

Her lost days from your eyes; round her you spread 

The vanished ring where Knight and Beauty rode. 

Your gallant tongue her memory's chariot, 

Till, rising tall, she leaned her cheek, bright then. 

Proud with youth's flush, and said, "Fair son, this 
spot 

A prince once kissed. Now does he pass again." 

So lightly drew thou pain from many a life, 

While in thine own heart turned and turned the knife. 



53 



xxxvm 

Thou art all soul, all airy loveliness, 

And thou art gone; but still thy wounds I bind, 

Still lift thy head and with cool leaves caress 

Thy brow of pain and fire; still strive to find 

The healing herb that never grew for thee; 

Still wrestle with dark gods for thy white dream, 

And challenge Fate with every artery, 

While tears on our two faces make one stream. 

Nay, drained now of life's ache, thou goest free, 

Outside of time, this jail; dost give thy nod 

To sunsets that the sun looks west to see; 

Knowing at last thyself, myself, and God; 

And with a sign so overpayst thy debt 

All I have tendered seems vain counterfeit. 



54 



XXXIX 

The music-mannered stream that silverly 
Wound round our lives in thread unbreakable 
Till they made one where life's far sources be, 
Flows by me now, an azure lyric still; 
Still keeps its mystic tongue, its soul that knows 
Unwhispering pools of rest, as love may keep 
Unsounded depths yet gossip seem to those 
Who listen but with ears. stream, I sleep 
Still hearing thy low cymbals, sounds that break 
With shattered secrets of thy leaping way 
Whose tale unbaffled would these mountains shake. 
Thou that wert dewdrop and wilt be the sea. 
Beauty's swift question, wilt thou now not pause. 
Silent for him whose heart thine answer was? 



55 



XL 



How often on some bough arched o^er thy breast, 
Its longing curve just foiled of thine embrace, 
Where mid the leaves thy murmurs made a nest, 
WeVe sat with down-compelled gaze to trace 
Spirit that passed untraceable and learn 
The voice of motion ! With our eyes we heard. 
And laid a hush on ears that served no turn 
In that deep hour when Deity unsphered 
Of all His worlds a parle with love to keep. 
Still art thou kind, my stream. Companionly, 
When all the wild wood lies in midnight sleep, ^ 
Thou bringst the glistening bough, the mystery; 
But for thy golden lover no more hears. 
Thou too art widowed and leav'st me thy tears. 



56 



VIII 



XLI 

WHAT a lover must thou be, old Time, 

With so much beauty to thy bosom folded ! 

The queens that reigned o'er monarchies of rhyme, 

And by new worship ever newly moulded; 

With all the Helens of the lyreless Troys, 

Sisters of Laura, Beatrice, Eloise, 

Who shone on worshippers denied the voice 

To set their name 'mong song's divinities ! 

And happy thou, my Dear, who now dost share 

The secrets of Time's eyes. 0, smile thou must, 

As Pity smileth, seeing mortals here 

Laying another song on Helen's dust. 

But of thy joy I dream unjealously. 

Knowing in all thy loves thou lovest me. 



59 



XLII 

Ah me, if in some laurel dale unscarred 

By more than trail of nymph or nibbling deer, 

A smiling boy might from the leafy guard t . 

Of tender branches bravely on me peer 

With eyes whose steadfast bronze yet told of storm, 

Stilled as the seas are stilled, deep as the deep, 

Eyes that but one could father,— one yet warm 

Because that small lad lived to hold and keep 

The gift of flame God could not choose let die, — 

How I would clasp him while his wonder stared, 

And, wife and queen, bend me handmaidenly 

If then his mother passed, — she who had dared 

Death's house to enter of wild love's accord 

And ransom gain I won not for my lord ! 



60 



XLIII 

What fiery dust the stolid earth must hold, 
So many passions have in her been laid ! 
Lights she her Autumn colors at that mould, 
The secret of her flame of secrets made? 
Does that which ate the heart devour the sky 
From hills like rubies heaped, denying even 
A grave's dear gloom to pain that sought to lie 
Covered with gentle dark's untroubling heaven? 
Yet must I love thee, Autumn, love thee more 
Than in past days of worship at thy fires ; 
The kindled heart that did with me adore 
Hath fed thee deathless fuel ; when thy pyres 
Resurgent ache, then must my eyelids burn 
Falling 'neath kisses that with thee return. 



61 



XLIV 

But greenwood clocks are pulsing and the year 

Wakes with arbutus ; now the hillsides wear 

Their daintiest necklace ; now a voice I hear, 

" Love-runs-a-laughing : little flower, bear 

That name for us." Soon shall a darling crowd 

Make fairy bridges for the days that tread 

Song-ringed past orchid queens, past gypsies loud 

As circus bells, past hoods of blue and red, 

To meet our pearl azalea, — tall and white 

Nun of the forest rising holily 

By sisters flaming. Oh, but from a height 

Where leaves blew back to let the new world by, 

Today I heard the bobolink's clear ring 

And did not smile. Forgive me, my love's Spring ! 



62 



XLV 

Our locust by the water trembles white, 
And o'er the stream her foamy welcome swells ; 
Then falls your softest laughter, floating light 
As tho* a breeze had put on fairy bells ; 
The laugh you gave when, glad discoverers. 
We hunted home a scented wing of air 
And found the tree that once among the firs 
Of Horeb hill made there a mount of myrrh 
And over Tyre a haunting girdle wound 
Like odor in a dream. Ghost-delicate, 
Again that fragrant wing uplifts the ground, 
Whilst primal dust is young as thou in fate. 
But as dead worlds fair in thy laughter bloomed. 
Not in my sighs, but smiles, live thou untombed. 



63 



XLVI 

Let not a picture drawn on eyelids shut 

Fill all my world ; but may I, open gazing, 

No symbol lose that liberal God hath put 

Before my chastened eyes, their burden raising 

To faith's pure height where burdens winged run, 

An angel breed, to keep our feet from stones. 

may I as the sea that, seeking one, 

Finds on its breast a thousand trembling moons, 

Hold thee, my love, in all mine eyes embrace 

Of loveliness ! As bright through channelled moss 

The forest water winds, be now a grace 

Enwoven for me through Nature's every dross ; 

And touch of bending, sweet immensity 

Make my least day orb mystical with thee ! 



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IX 



XLVII 

Here is no beauty I may look upon 

And think not of thee ; for all ways we went, 

And every way did bud or jewel own 

That for a moment made thine eyes content 

And spill sweet sun to mine. When low winds lift 

The milky bellwoods, windowing stealthily 

The leaf-ceiled dells where sit in magic thrift 

The spinners of the green, — when lone I see 

The first white trilium like a poised, lost gull 

In th' emerald glen, — shall not my pulses stop, 

Waiting for thine? Of fatal peace as full 

As still, blue seas seen from a mountain top 

Is thought of thee afar. Near, nearer, dear. 

Or I must drop me to those fathoms clear. 



67 



XLVIII 

Thou bvedst thy earth, and wilt not haste from her ; 

But wilt go lingering over valley pools, 

Like children's eyes, where soft fern-lashes stir ; 

Go lingering where the last high peak overrules 

The thickening ranges ; stay to greet, not spurn 

The alms-fed moon, that beggar of the skies ; 

Still looking back till thou at last must turn 

Where it is morning unto Prosperous eyes ; 

The while my thoughts, a lured and breathless band, 

Struggling to reach thee, grow most strangely fair, — 

Fair as the coasts where we may never land, — 

But lose thee not, and Fd content me here 

To wait my hour, if I might fear no more 

To hear, far in the skies, a shutting door. 



68 



XLIX 

Beloved, if I keep my spirit fed, 

Hear not the rustling world, forget her bays. 

Naught caring if I go unlaurelled 

In eyes of fortune, so I fill my days 

With thoughts that bud and bloom for heavenly wear, 

Sending my soul to seek thy country out, 

Spending still hours in wondering of thee there. 

And making vision sweet of every doubt, 

Wilt thou not come some perfect eve to touch, 

As might a god, with visitant fair feet 

The meadows where I wait, nor scorn too much 

The habits of my earth, but even let 

Thy hand be first upon a daisy nigh, 

And stand with me to watch the swallows fly? 



How gently I would move by thee, and strive 

To make my step as noiseless as thine own ! 

And we should find the old dreams still alive, 

And not a dead leaf on our altars blown. 

Ah, farther ! To that ambered, orient sea 

We never saw with mortal eyes awake, 

Though in our sleep it rippled ; glidingly 

To all fair places carried like an ache 

In our blind breasts ; and sometime rest us by 

Old temples carved as though the fingered Dawn 

Religion were and wrought in ivory 

Gifts for the God of Light ; so fair the moon 

Might there forget to pass, as we, love ! 

Below in wonder, as the moon above. 



70 



LI 



Then should I seek again a toiler's place 

Where Life, grown faint and human, strains to lift 

Above her strife a lit and lyric face. 

And minutes pass as spears, a wound their gift, — 

Thou wouldst not leave me guideless ? — thou who needst 

To build no more the stoic barricade 

'Gainst scathe of word or winds? Nay, thou who 
feedst 

Thy soul at last, unblinded, undismayed. 

Upon the truth 'twas madness here to taste. 

Wilt teach me even that savorous peril eat, 

And with me lingering make the fleshless feast, 

Till that dim, upland ground that loves thy feet 

Findeth a rival in these cast-off lands. 

now, beloved, now ! Thine eyes, thy hands ! 



71 



lil 



My prayers are thee ! But, Dear, what means this 
thing? 

That we do walk together as a wind 

Heedless of garden gates where sigh and cling 

The little roses that once sought to bind 

Our hearts to time ; making no pause beside 

Blue, curling waters where our thoughts like doves 

Drifted to wild-leaf nest ; smiling where cried 

The tragic marshes with strange shadow loves 

That bound us from the sun. The maples burn 

Their April wicks of passion ; willows yet 

Light their slim candles at the dawn's fire-urn ; 

But here is glow that no Spring ever lit ; 

Nor hills of vision where we fainting fell 

May hold us now, so pale their miracle. 



72 



Lin 

No longer backward, treading a lost dream, 

But where the Future lifts her morning stole ; 

Past nations that embracing know one name. 

Past faces like the flowers of one soul, 

God's soul, humanity. Bells never choired 

From time's old sweetness with the sweet of these 

Making clear song of all that dim aspired 

In our old struggles, barren ecstasies. 

Tears and despairs. lordliest Love, that keepst 

Eternal pact with Life, naught can discrown 

Thee of one bud of flame howe'er thou weepst ; 

For though these bodies dear are beaten down. 

As ocean triumphs by her broken waves. 

Thy tidal breath breaks warm above thy graves. 



73 



